


Just People After All

by tinypinkmouse



Category: Transformers (Bayverse)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Insanity, M/M, Memories, Non-Graphic Violence, Noncanonical Character Death, Post-Canon, Post-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-10
Updated: 2010-08-10
Packaged: 2017-10-11 00:51:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/106409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinypinkmouse/pseuds/tinypinkmouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oh, who'd have thought it, apparently life is that simple.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just People After All

**Author's Note:**

> Ignores everything after the first movie.

  
A splash of red. No. No, lots and lots of red. It always takes a lot of red. The screech of metal, the sound of gunfire. Smoke. The taste and sight and smell of smoke. Choking you. And the screams. Can't forget the screams. Never forget the screams.

This is how a new world begins. A world with aliens. Giant robot aliens.

It's an easy world. Simple.

You have the Decepticons. Evil, bad, horrible Decepticons.

You have the Autobots. Good and noble Autobots.

The Decepticons want to destroy and enslave, the Autobots do not.

If we get caught in the middle. Well… a splash of red and a squish is not a surprise. They are giant alien robots.

Simple.

And they're at war. A war older than the human race. They're a more advanced species millions of years old and they still fight. Because people fight and it turns out that giant alien robots are people too. Sort of.

One thing I know about people is that they aren't good or bad. They're just people, doing what they have to do.

Suddenly your simple new world isn't so simple after all.

There's a battlefield. I've known a few since I found myself in this world of Autobots and Decepticons.

Human battlefields with the screams and the taste and smell of blood and shit and piss.

Alien battlefields with the screams and the taste and smell of oil and smoke and metal.

Not so different. Death is death. War is war.

This battlefield is a mix of both. The battle is over by now though. The victors... are there ever any?

I look at the ruins in front of me. The smoke rising from the remnants of what was a whole town. Not a big one. Not a significant one. But one that happened to be in the way.

The only dead that lie one the ground are humans. Soldiers and innocents. Men, women and children.

Some of the Autobots were injured and no doubt the fleeing Decepticons didn't leave unscathed.

This was a victory then. We stopped the Decepticons from doing whatever they were trying.

This is how the rest of the world woke up to this brave new world.

The rest of the world doesn't see the division between good and evil, Autobot and Decepticon. And can you blame them?

It's still a simple world though.

If we get caught in the middle. A splash of red and a squish.

In the case of one out of the way town. Lots and lots of red.

See for me it was clear from the beginning. The Autobots were the good guys. It was easy for me to believe wholeheartedly, considering my involvement with them. Considering my best friend was one of them.

Bumblebee. Cheerful, happy Bumblebee.

And I became a soldier, because it felt only natural then.

But fighting does change a person.

And later I met other Autobots and learned things about the ones I already knew that changed the way I saw them. And things were not so black and white.

I realised that a scout in a war is also called a spy and an assassin. Brave and cheerful Bumblebee.

I met Sunstreaker. A fighter like no other. He would have gladly squashed any human who happened to get in the way. Autobot too.

And the thing that changed everything.

A few months after Megatron's death Barricade drives in.

No one tries to stop him. No one tries to attack him.

Bumblebee who had saved me from Barricade. Whom I'd seen in that terrifyingly desperate battle with Barricade. Bumblebee waits for him to transform and then walks up to him. No one does anything, says anything as he walks up to Barricade, lays a hand on his arm and says something in Cybertronian.

And Barricade. Barricade nods at him. Nods and walks to Optimus.

It makes no sense. No sense at all.

They leave and Bumblebee stares after them and looks sad. Sad. For Barricade.

So I ask. No I demand an explanation. What else can I do? How can I accept that they let a Decepticon, a Decepticon who almost killed me, almost killed Bumblebee, to just drive in. Walk away with Optimus. Like an old friend.

So Bumblebee tells me. A sad look in his blue optics.

Barricade has come for Jazz. Wonderful, cool, carefree Jazz. Dead Jazz. Because Barricade and Jazz were bonded. Spark bonded Bumblebee says. Says like it means something special.

Bonded for ever two sparks. Forever together. Until one is extinguished. It's a wonder Barricade wasn't driven mad, but then Bumblebee says, theirs was a special case. Because they were bonded. And how can I reconcile that with all I know. Autobot and Decepticon bonded together. Jazz, friendly and funny and Barricade, cruel and terrifying.

Love?

I'm told it happened before he was Barricade. And that shatters all I ever thought I knew about my friends. Because Barricade wasn't always Barricade. No, he was Autobot once. He was Prowl. Until the Decepticons warped his programming. Changed him and he became what he is now.

And the bond between the two couldn't be broken.

Love and hate. Good and evil. Autobot and Decepticon.

What is left of my simple world?

One thing. We should know better than to get caught in between.

And so for most people it ends as it began. In fire and blood and death.

For me, here at the end of my life it ends in quiet. Horrible all encompassing quiet. Because you have to understand that they are my friends.

There was war.

And it ended. In a way.

At least humans learnt not to be caught in between.

We learned what we had to to drive them away. The Autobots left by choice, the Decepticons didn't.

And there was so much blood.

So I left. With them. The Autobots. My friends.

And here, now, I die.

In the quiet of space. Far from Earth. Far from humanity.

I die to save my friends.

Because it's simple after all.

  


 

**Author's Note:**

> Ugh... I have written a fic where Barricade turns out to have been Prowl. That was like original the first hundred times someone did it.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Just People After All [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/313227) by [tinypinkmouse_podfic (tinypinkmouse)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinypinkmouse/pseuds/tinypinkmouse_podfic)




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